Deep Thought

Some more, some more:- African and white-China Crisis Blindness-The Fall Trackin' the dog-Screaming Blue Messiahs The Passenger-Iggy Pop Israel/Arabian nights-Siouxsie and the Banshees

[quote name='MythSte' post='611056' date='Sep 28 2009, 05:40 PM']I worry about this all the time! I remedied it by putting the lead through the side handle of my cab. Having said that, If i walked away the barefaced is so light it would come with me. Who needs wireless?! heh.[/quote] I've got a sheet of rubberised mesh that I got from Homebase, which I put on top of the cab to stop mine 'migrating'. I often don't bother with the lead through the cab handle these days, although it's a good idea if I remember.

[quote name='Raggy' post='608487' date='Sep 25 2009, 11:16 AM']+1 Yup, anything by The Stranglers. And of course Norman Watt-Roy's Rhythm Stick.[/quote] All of the above, plus:- Bill Withers-Lovely Day Ten City-That's the way love is The Cure-Charlotte Sometimes The Damned-Shadow of love White Stripes-Seven nation army-although I'm not sure that's a bass

ZZ Top (I can work on the beard)

Through a contact at work, we've managed to wangle a deal to record at Sawmillls studio next week. For those not informed, this is the studio at Golant, not far from me, where a stack of big names have recorded, including Oasis (recorded Definitely Maybe there), Muse and Robert Plant to name a few. It's very remote (hence its attraction to big artists) and only accessible by boat. We'd been planning to get some proper studio recording done for a while, but we never dreamed we'd be doing it there! Will report back when we've done-anyone else been there? [url="http://www.sawmills.co.uk/"]http://www.sawmills.co.uk/[/url]

[quote name='ezbass' post='602811' date='Sep 19 2009, 11:44 AM']Not me, but it did happen to friend of mine. He's a huge Billy Cobham fan and went to see him at the Jazz Cafe in Camden, problem was he took the wife. Whilst having their meal upstairs overlooking the stage, Billy Cobham passes by on his way to the dressing room only to have my mate's wife accost him and say "My husband is your biggest fan". He say's the earth couldn't open up and swallow him quickly enough.[/quote] That, bless her, is exactly the kind of thing my wife would do.

You have to be persistent-just handing over a demo and waiting for them to ring you will get you nowhere-they never, ever do. You have to keep going back and making a pain in the arse of yourself until they relent and give you a gig. I'm crap at it, but it's a necessary evil. Also have a good press pack to go with the demo, saying something about the band, your history, influences, set list, how much you charge etc. And make sure there are contact numbers, even though they won't ring you.

I met JJ Burnel last year at the Manson's guitar show in Exeter. I was first in the queue and had a very pleasant 5-minute conversation with him, got a poster signed, and Jason How, the boss of Rotosound, was kind enough to take a picture of me and JJ which he subsequently emailed me. I managed to resist the urge to prostrate myself on the ground and shout 'I'm not worthy!', and don't think I made too much of a prat of myself. I still get a big kick when I think about it now.

It has come to light in recent months that our guitarist has a problem coming up with guitar lines of his own ( I write bass lines and lyrics, he comes up with his own guitar lines). I genuinely think he'd rather play covers than come up with stuff of his own. This is strange to me-the first things I ever played on bass were lines I'd come up with myself-mainly so nobody could tell me I was playing them wrong! I've always come up with bass lines of my own, yet in talking to others, I get the impression he's not the only one who doesn't write their own material. You folks write your own, or happy playing other people's? (not that there's anything wrong with that!)

I've had to have two steroid injections for mine-they improve the symptoms but they don't cure it. The second time I had physio, they gave me some stretch exercises which made a big difference to me. I've been a bit lax with them lately and it's started to come back, but nowhere near as bad as before. I think I need a concentrated programme of loosening up my forearm tendons again. Go see a physio, because they can work out what your specific problem is and give you the right exercises-your tennis elbow may be different to mine. Mine is apparently not 'classic' tennis elbow. I find if I remember to do my exercises before doing something (mine doesn't like playing bass using fingers, especially sitting down), and if it does hurt, a bit of stretching can help too.

There's a whole list of his kit here [url="http://www.musewiki.org/Bass"]http://www.musewiki.org/Bass[/url] I really like Chris Wolstenholme, but I've wondered ever since seeing the HAARP DVD why he needs quite so many basses. He seemed to have a different J-bass for every song on there. I did rather like the chrome '51 P with the red scratch plate he played at Teignmouth though, and I'm not normally partial to that style of P. I watched the documentary about Teignmouth on BBC3 on Friday, and I've seen the footage on the Radio 1 site, but I'm stuffed if I can find anything via the red button. Where is it?

I'm a Precision nut, with very little desire to own much else-however my US P is about as much money as I'd want to spend on a bass. I can't look after them-no matter how hard I try they end up getting dinged and scratched. I can live with doing that to a Fender, but a £1000+ custom job is a different kettle of [i]poisson[/i]. I've had cheaper basses and didn't get on with 'em-probably because they weren't Precisions and that's what I wanted. I don't look after basses well enough to justify spending big money. That having been said, there's just a chance of something in the pipeline....

[quote name='BurritoBass' post='587688' date='Sep 2 2009, 04:55 PM']Fender Precisions all the way! I like other basses but it always comes back to P-basses for me[/quote] Same again.

[quote name='foal30' post='586174' date='Aug 31 2009, 11:45 PM']Sisters of Mercy were great, really liked some of their stuff.[/quote] One of my favourite bands ever. First saw them at Plymouth Top Rank just before 'Body and Soul' was released-was absolutely blown away and went on to see them three more times. I absolutely detested all the synthy pop bands around at the time (including Tears for Fears!) but I had a special hatred for The Thompson Twins, because they released a single called 'Sister of mercy'. Every time I was asked what music I liked, and I mentioned the Sisters of Mercy, I would get 'Oh yes, Thompson Twins'. NOOOOOO!!! NOT THE BLOODY THOMPSON TWINS!!! NOTHING TO DO WITH THE BLOODY THOMPSON TWINS!!! AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH! etc. etc. It used to annoy me somewhat. I was later to be horrified to find that one of my favourite Debbie Harry solo songs, 'I Want That Man', was written by Alannah Currie of the bloody Thompson Twins! Whilst all this was going on, I was listening to stuff like Husker Du, The Three Johns, Screaming Blue Messiahs and the Gun Club. Never had any time for the Tears for Fearses, Howard Joneses or Nick Kershaws of the time. Loathed the lot of 'em. Quite liked Heaven 17, but that was about the extent of my liking for synthy pop.

+1 here for Roqsolid-I have some of theirs for my cabs, delighted with them.

Ha, I do like that emoticon. Glad it's not just me that doesn't like the Bacchus.

Bleurgh. I've seen some lovely Bacchuses (Bacchi?) but that looks like a bogey. I'm not buying it.

[quote name='Telebass' post='575258' date='Aug 20 2009, 10:50 AM']This weekend, we're doing the Summit Festival on top of Kitt Hill, near Callington, Cornwall.[/quote] Did Wille and the Bandits play there? They played after us at a charity do in Altarnun, and said they'd just come from a festival at Callington. Nice bunch of lads-we had a good time-did you?

I like that too. I normally hate MM's, and I may even be responsible for the 'toilet seat' references ( I know I've used that phrase in my previous castigations of the Bongo design), but I think that looks good-and I'm not normally a fan of the Tele shape for bass, either. It's the MM oval scratchplate that I don't get on with-I saw a chap using one on Saturday night with no scratchplate, and it didn't look at all bad-and sounded great. Oh no, not another bass to add to my list of 'basses I must look into when I've got some spare money' ie. never. That's never going to happen with the Bongo, though.

[quote name='starman' post='575995' date='Aug 20 2009, 07:52 PM']JJ Burnel[/quote] Yep, same here. Never occurred to me to play anything else after I heard Rattus Norvegicus, and saw the Stranglers at the Cornwall Coliseum, July 1980.